LIMA: The China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) expects to invest at least US$2bil in Peru over the next 10 years, after having recently bought Petrobras' assets in the country, a top CNPC executive told Reuters on Tuesday.

"We are looking for more opportunities in Peru, to acquire companies or to participate in the bidding of oil fields," Gong Bencai, head of CNPC's Latin America division, said in an interview at CNPC's Lima offices.

Peru has already approved an environmental permit allowing CNPC to conduct US$1bil of exploratory work in a natural gas block purchased from Brazilian state-run oil company Petrobras.

More investment is likely on the way, the CNPC executive said.

In particular, he said CNPC is eyeing a US$4bil gas pipeline project in southern Peru.

"We are very interested in the southern pipeline," Gong said.

The pipeline would transport natural gas from the Andean Camisea deposit to thermoelectric plants on Peru's Pacific coast.

BATON ROUGE: U.S. labor markets may be approaching full employment in certain industries and regions, Atlanta Federal Reserve Bank President Dennis Lockhart said on Tuesday, pointing to skilled trades in places such as Louisiana's oil sector.

The situation has created a patchwork across the country, with many other aspects of the job market still weak and in need of continued loose monetary policy.

Lockhart said that in order to support full employment he was willing to tolerate an overshoot of the Fed's 2 percent inflation target to as high as 2.5 percent.

He also said he felt markets would respond better if the Fed continues reinvesting the proceeds of any maturing bonds until after the point when it has decided to begin increasing interest rates.- Reuters

BATON ROUGE: The long-term neutral federal funds rate remains around 4 percent, not the lower levels some have said may result from a weakened economy, Atlanta Federal Reserve Bank President Dennis Lockhart said on Tuesday.

Lockhart said he thought the economy would be strong enough over time to warrant a federal funds rate close to the long-term average. He also said he was confident that workers have not been locked out of jobs because of skills mismatch and will come back to work as conditions improve.- Reuters